Judith Dickinson: I love working with people and getting to know them in a special way. Each one is such a challenge. It’s almost like a puzzle to figure out. Especially someone’s face––to figure out exactly what is that likeness. Every face is so different. Even twins have such different characteristics. Very minute details can make you either capture the likeness or not. But I like that challenge. -------------------------------- Trusting the artist is key, but one of the most important parts of the commission process is the artist’s ability to extract the story and what the collector wants to communicate. And that’s a skill many have fine tuned over the years. Pete Tillack: It’s a tool. One I didn’t mean to grow, but I did through my travels. A lot of the time I was by myself so to meet people, I would have to start conversations and learn to talk to people and be honest with a lot of things. Being really honest with people allows them to be honest with you. It’s sort of amazing how open people get with me. And I hold it. It’s in my memory bank and it comes out in the pieces to their degree of comfortability.
TED NUTTALL: I’m after that moment of expression or emotion that I saw on their face when they’re sitting for me in the studio. As I paint, I’m trying to evoke that expression and emotion that was in their essence, and also trying to imbue the painting with how I felt the moment I experienced that expression and emotion. I think of them more as recordings of moments of expression and emotion. Judith Dickinson: I work with them through the whole process. I’ll
"Lake Reflections" by Judith Dickinson
show them my sketch, which I always start with, and they can follow each stage of the process. So they get involved in it from the start. Some people just want me to do it and surprise them and others want to be really involved through the whole thing. Kirk Randle: I have to be sensitive to who the people are and what they're about. The piece that I'm creating is something I'm not
going to live with. I have to be sensitive to what interests them. I have to listen to what they want and how they want it. Then I go about trying to come up with something that's going to work for that space. Usually, I'm creating the focal point of the house and so it has to mean something to them and it has to be something special for them. So, I try to engage them and draw them into what we're doing, then take all that information and start executing the piece of artwork.
"After the Rain in the Wind River Mountains" by Kirk Randle
Page 7
Issue 3 | Winter 2023
Made with FlippingBook Digital Proposal Creator